Today was a pretty awful day, so I appreciate all of your concern and interest.
I did as much as I could, with Maxi's help, but I know it wasn't in "showing" condition... not according to the standards the realty experts set for optimum salability.
Even so, my landlord got mad about the "battic" my friends and I made in the never-used-goes-to-nowhere-hallway. I had asked my friends to be careful to NOT block the door at the far end because in case of dire emergency, that's how we would exit -- me on my butt of course as it isn't handicapped accessible. Anyway, my friends did block that door with some stuff.
SO... landlord, gentleman (!) that he always is said "You have to throw that stuff out! If there was a fire and you couldn't get out, I WOULD BE RUINED! I WOULD BE RUINED and you know how much I've tried to help you!"
Interesting that he didn't say "you and Maxi are in danger" but "I would be ruined!" Interesting too that he claimed how much he's helped us. Helped? What did he mean by that, I'd like to know? He gets a handsome rent for this unit faithfully paid on time and in full each month. He gets a tenant who lives quietly, causes no trouble, cares for the grounds, has upgraded the interior, never complains or nags him in any way... It seems to me that as an owner he's had it pretty good. Wish I'd had it that good when I was a landlord!!
The realtor was unahppy with the interior -- not by anything I've done, but by the things he's neglected to do.
Looking at my kitchen, she said "Wow! I haven't seen walls like this in decades -- not since they were popular in the 1950's!"
He told a fib "Oh, I don't know when this was remodeled!"
He knows perfectly well the kitchen was done last in the late 1950's and the downstairs (my) bathroom was done in the early 1970's because we've discussed it.
By the way, my kitchen walls are covered in that really hideous cardboard original style laminate -- cardboard with a thin layer of shiny color. In this case it is blue in some areas and yellow in others. This was always mounted on walls with metal strips along the edges to hold it in place, like a large scale grid. And, because it is cardboard, any nail hole or damage is permanent. So when I moved in, I only hung stuff where there were holes already, but even so, I couldn't cover them all.
Ditto with the inexcusable kitchen floor he's promised repeatedly to replace.
Ditto ditto with the dining room carpet that he knew was stained when I moved in and also promised to replace.
The realtor sucked in her breath with joy when she saw our new family room my friends had done for me in June. That IS such a pretty place and miles ahead of the rest of the apartment.
And, she was not happy about the miniscule bathroom, in spite of the owners insistance that it could be doubled in size by knocking out the backwall into the useless closet and hallway. So why hasn't he done it?
So she ended the visit by telling him that the market is poor right now... it is a real "buyers" market, but no one is buying.
His attitude stinks, it really does. He is resentful at everyone else for decisions he has made and that, palies, has never made sense to me!
For instance... he keeps insisting that he and his wife's biggest dream is to own a single family home.
So they bought an apartment building in Portland and moved into one of the apartments. They rent the other units to party-types and then get really angry at all the noise and their lack of space and privacy.
So they bought this property here, then decided to not move in but to continue to use it as a rental.
So then he pulled a silly little trailer into the back yard so they could live here in the summer time.
So during the summer, when they are camping out in the back, using the hose for showers, using the lawyers bathroom upstairs, not having fans or a/c, he sits back there, drinking and getting resentful that the kid and I are in his "palace". That's actually what he calls it when he knocks on my door, intoxicated, telling me he wants to live here himself.
Then when it's time to sign a new lease, he renews it. Resentful.
Now he's acting all hard jawed and resolute.
It's hard to be sympathetic toward him as he makes his own difficulties, you know?
Merme
